


let's go, don't wait

by tanyart



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: First Dates, Flirting, Handcuffed Together, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-11
Updated: 2016-08-11
Packaged: 2018-08-08 01:53:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7738894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tanyart/pseuds/tanyart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gabriel and Jack get handcuffed together during a mission, which makes for a terrible first date.</p>
            </blockquote>





	let's go, don't wait

**Author's Note:**

> Quick and terrible, and too many bad jokes. Title from a song that is totally appropriate, I swear. (It's not.)

Gabriel and Jack begin dating, immediately.

It’s not a tentative start to their new relationship, but neither of them happen to be very tentative people once the ball starts rolling—or once the ball drops, as the case may be. They’ve wasted enough time staring after each other the past few months that the decision of dating actually sounds like good change of pace. And at this point, anything seems better than stress-inducing sexual tension and repressed feelings, even by Gabriel’s standards.

If anyone asks, Gabriel swears it’s for their emotional well-being and, according to the rest of Overwatch task force, everyone else’s well-being too. Jack makes no comment and only drags Gabriel to the conference room for a brief pep talk.

So after they sort their feelings to a more satisfactory level—namely, lots of kissing—they hit the ground running, doing the dating thing.

To no one’s surprise, the dating thing happens to be very difficult between two super soldiers on active duty. Less than a day goes by when Gabriel and Jack head out on their first mission together as a couple. They had joked about this mission being their first date, which of course means the mission goes to absolute shit within the first couple of hours.

Never let it be said that Gabriel Reyes and Jack Morrison ever did anything by halves. If they get captured, they _really_ get captured.

Their shared cell is onboard an air carrier en route to whatever secret base Talon holds. Gabriel’s got no weapons, no armor, and Jack’s left wrist cuffed to his right one. Neither one of them have joked about holding hands.

Their break up is spectacular. The Talon guard is in awe. They have underestimated Gabriel’s willingness to punch Jack right in the face, chained up or no.

“Hey,” the guard says, sharp. “Cut it out!”

“Mind your own business,” Gabriel snaps, his hands dripping with Jack’s blood.

“Fuck off,” Jack adds, glaring at the guard, and goes back to trying to strangle Gabriel with renewed vigor.

Fighting within the cell proves to be difficult but Gabriel hasn’t spent months in SEP without learning a few more tricks. The cell is barred with a transparent shield, glowing bright every time Gabriel bangs his elbow against it.

The guard comes into the cell, hard-light shield powering down. He aims his gun at them both. “Don’t make me shoot.”

“Yeah, that’s a fucking great idea. Shoot _him_ ,” Gabriel says, holding Jack up still so the guard can have an easier time aiming. He pushes Jack forward, arm dragging as Jack’s cuffed hand comes up to grapple his face in the worst game of _stop-hitting-yourself_.

Jack’s foot moves back, heel touching the front of Gabriel’s boot. Gabriel feels his blond hair brush against his face and it takes a huge amount of effort to ignore it. Their position is awkward, what with Gabriel pretty much hugging Jack from behind and Jack leaning into it. To make things worse, Jack is noticeably blushing to his ears.

The guard regards them both with an expression of mixed emotions, mostly confused.

Then Jack turns, spinning Gabe on his feet, just far enough that Gabe can yank the gun from the guard’s hands. Jack turns again to deliver a solid punch to the guy’s cheek and the guard hits the floor in a perfect, one-hit knock out.

Ahead of them, the cell is wide open, alarms silent.

“Next time,” Jack says reproachfully, trying to staunch the flow of blood from his nose. “Next time you could warn me.”

Gabriel thinks the cut lip and bloody nose looks fantastic on Jack, but he has the grace to look a little sorry about it. There’s not much time before the air carrier goes on full alert, but he presses a clumsy kiss to Jack’s mouth. It is probably not the best or most professional apology under the circumstances but Jack’s lips twitch into a smile, and he says nothing. So it’s off the official reports then.

After an unsuccessful search for a passcode or keycard, they try to shoot the handcuffs off. Gabriel aims the muzzle between their hands and fires. The links flicker, hard-light breaking for a moment before the connection condenses and reforms. Gabriel gives it an experimental tug, but the cuffs hold fast. Jack’s knuckles bump against his.

Jack’s frown is a tiny bit anxious, but he says, “I mean, if I _had_ to be chained to someone during a mission...”

“Aw.”

“...I would’ve picked McCree,” Jack finishes mournfully. “At least I can pull rank.”

“New idea. Break your wrist. That might work.”

“Haha,” Jack deadpans, but he looks at his wrist, expression thoughtful and borderline determined.

Gabriel pulls, yanking Jack’s hand out of his own grasp. “No, and that’s an order.”

Jack straightens. “Yes, sir.”

Gabriel relaxes at Jack’s neutral tone. A romantic relationship between a superior and a subordinate is hardly ever a good thing, and there is a decent amount of red flags waving feebly in the back of Gabriel’s military-oriented mind. He is sure Jack’s aware of it too, but they haven’t had the time to discuss the particulars of their boundaries, which is something Gabriel knows they need to do. He tables it for later, much later, probably after they get out of this mess.

“Looks a bit different from Vishkar tech,” Jack observes. He twists his wrist within the cuff, testing. “We probably need a hard-light user to get these off.”

“If SEP gave you any training for that, now’s the time to tell me.”

“And miss being chained to you?” Jack smiles, midwest farmboy charm on full power.

Gabriel rolls his eyes, but somehow their situation seems a little less dire. Incredible. He can’t believe how bad he has it for Jack.

“C’mon,” he grunts and heads out the door.

By silent agreement, Gabriel gets to keep the gun and Jack follows behind him, covering their six. The floor beneath them rumbles from the carrier’s hover engines, a steady reminder they are miles up in the air. And somewhere in the carrier, Talon has a stolen file of sensitive Overwatch plans. Everything’s been encrypted of course, but encryption means very little these days.

Gabriel briefly considers bailing, though it leaves a bad taste in his mouth, in both a personal and professional sense. The carrier isn’t huge, but it’s still a lot of ground to cover. At most, there could be twenty Talon agents onboard.

Jack presses behind him, his stance easy and confident. He doesn’t appear worried despite the turn of events.

Their mission is still clear: secure the objective or, failing that, destroy it. The only question is if Gabriel wants to go through the trouble of retrieving the files when blowing up the entire air carrier seems like the easier way out.

“Do both,” whispers Jack, like Gabriel’s unfairly attractive shoulder angel. Or devil, most likely.

“ _Obviously_ ,” Gabriel replies, voice soft over the hum of the air carrier. He wonders if Jack’s usual caution goes out the window when he wants to show off. “Well, if you’re game.”

Jack signs an affirmative with his free hand.

“Listen, if this all goes sour,” Gabriel says, as if the mission hasn’t already gone sour, “I want you to-”

“Yeah, I’ll kill you,” Jack agrees with alarming speed, though Gabriel chalks it up to typical SEP protocol. “And destroy the body.”

“That’s real sweet. But no. No, I meant shoot off my hand.”

“Less permanent than death,” Jack muses. “I like it.”

“Yeah,” Gabriel says with equal parts sarcasm and grudging fondness. “Anyway. It would be beyond embarrassing if they find my body handcuffed to yours.”

“Wow.”

With that important detail settled, they make their way out of the security hold, which Gabriel suspects is actually modified cargo space, judging from the lack of actual security. From what Overwatch knows, Talon seems to be a budding terrorist group, newly formed and underfunded.

Small blessings, Gabriel supposes. He makes his way through the narrow hallway towards the bow end of the carrier, noting the lack of maintenance personnel. Underfunded _and_ understaffed. Definitely not more than twenty people onboard. Gabriel rolls his shoulders back. He’s beginning to like these odds now.

The end of the hallway reveals a lonely little ladder with a conspicuously open hatch. Soft blue light shines down from the entrance, almost angelic in its quiet glow, but Gabriel pauses, gun aimed steady.

A shadow momentarily blocks the light from the hatch, the silhouette of a man walking by from above.

Gabriel throws up a few more silent gestures and Jack moves ahead of him. They approach the ladder together and Jack has the nerve to throw him one cheeky grin before he starts to climb.

This, of course, puts his ass right in Gabriel’s face. Gabriel’s dangling hand raises up like he’s got a very unenthusiastic answer to a question he’d rather not say out loud.

He sees Jack peer out from the hatch before ducking back down. Jack doesn’t risk looking at Gabriel, but his cuffed hand signals _two_ , and Gabriel gives an acknowledging tug.

For a moment, Jack tenses, and Gabriel has enough intuition to give Jack some more slack by taking two more steps up the ladder. It’s not enough—their hands clang against the ladder when Jack lurches up, his free hand grabbing on to the Talon agent’s leg. Jack yanks once, enhanced strength kicking in, and the guard goes tumbling down the hatch.

The fall is not nearly enough to injure anyone but Gabriel fixes the problem with a pulse blast to the guard’s head. The sound echos, and Gabriel scowls. Too loud.

“Up, up!” Gabriel hisses, holding up his gun.

Jack scrambles through the hatch, their linked wrists dragging Gabriel the rest of the way out, more by Jack’s own power than Gabriel’s own feet. The second guard is already sighting him down with their gun and Gabriel has a moment where he stares right down the barrel before Jack yanks him again and he veers a hard right. The sound of bullet fizzes past his ear, but he’s got no time to thank Jack just yet.

Jack lurches to his feet, moving towards the guard, and Gabriel is already feeling better for it. They are on familiar ground, military-trained footwork ingrained in everything they do. Jack has always been a straightforward fighter and weeks of sparring with him aren’t wasted on Gabriel. He reads Jack’s movements like an open manual, timing his steps to match Jack’s rhythm.

It’s like an unrehearsed dance. Jack pushes and Gabriel moves along for him. The gun becomes momentarily forgotten in Gabriel’s hand, but the fight is long over even before it began. Jack makes his final move, throwing his weight on the guard, his chained hand on their throat. His fingers don’t quite reach all the way around so Gabriel follows him through, pressing his own hand on the guard’s neck.

The guard rattles out the last of his breath and it occurs to Gabriel that they have choked a man to death together, and he hasn’t even officially bought Jack dinner yet.

“Yeah, this is like, fourth date stuff,” Jack says afterwards. He wipes the sweat from his forehead with the back of his free hand. “For when we want to get _really_ serious.”

Gabriel yanks on the handcuffs, hard, and stands up without warning. Jack makes a noise of protest, stumbling over the guard’s body.

“ _Steak and wine_ , he says,” Jack mutters under his breath, nursing his wrist. “ _Movie nights_ , he says. _Flowers and chocolate_.”

“I never said flowers or chocolates. Here’s a gun.”

Jack’s eyes light up, more happy than if Gabriel had given actual chocolates or flowers. “Thanks. I love it. A looted gun, just what I’ve always wanted.”

“Nothing but the best for you,” Gabriel mutters, heart beating faster for no reason. He makes a mental note to get Jack a proper gift later. _Hell._

The rest of the air carrier is strangely empty, save for two hapless pilots in the cockpit and one very pissed off omnic. The rest of the Talon crew seem to have abandoned ship, judging from empty slots of missing emergency jetpacks. Apparently word travels fast about two experimentally enhanced soldiers on the loose.

Gabriel starts off by ejecting both pilots out the emergency hatch without much ceremony, totaling the number of potential enemy deaths to four. A bad number for a date, but a pretty good count for a mission. The omnic is a little more tricky, its two yellow eyes flickering with overloaded information. From it, Overwatch’s data files slotted in its arm in the form of a silver disc.

They take no chances. Jack fires first, hitting the omnic through the head while Gabriel shoots the chest. It takes two quick bursts, and Gabriel snaps the disc free. He doesn’t know how much information has been already uploaded and sent off, decrypted or not, but with the omnic dead the flow has been stopped at least. He frowns, turning the disc in his hands. A little beat up, but still intact.

“Reyes,” Jack says, his head turned to the air carrier’s control panel.

Gabriel slips the disc into his pocket and allows Jack to lead him to the control panel. He sees the first problem immediately, which isn’t so much a problem but rather one of their objectives done a little too early for comfort.

“Well, at least we don’t have to set any charges,” Jack says, ever optimistic, and dodges his own handcuffed palm as Gabriel attempts to make him swat his face.

The control panel blinks red, a cheery timer set to five minutes and counting down. Gabriel looks over his shoulder to the walls, loose packing straps devoid of any emergency equipment. His gaze then settles to the floor’s storage compartments with a growing sense of carefully controlled hope.

“Bet you it’s flowers and chocolates,” he tells Jack as they quickly flip open the floor panels.

“Bet you it’s my fist in your face next time you-” Jack halts in mid-sentence. He takes a deep breath. “I want a bouquet of orange flowers.”

Eye-searing neon orange, the most beautiful color of emergency supplies. They drag the duffle bag out and open it, finding one old-fashioned parachute.

One, single-use parachute made from cloth without a single jetpack or even one hover engine installed.

It’s better than nothing, and Gabriel knows he has no right to complain.

“Gabe,” Jack begins, grabbing Gabriel’s arm. “If you love me-”

“I’m pulling rank. The parachute’s mine, Morrison,” Gabriel says, unpacking the parachute.

“Har har, nice try. We’re chained together, asshole.”

Despite his words, Gabriel starts strapping the parachute to Jack, clumsy and slow with only one hand. “You’re lucky we’re handcuffed. C’mon, Morrison, help me out.”

Jack’s smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes. He doesn’t resist, but his reluctance is clear.

“You wear it, Commander.” This one’s not off the books.

“What? And miss having the chance of being your personal landing cushion? Giving you a piggyback ride?” Gabriel tightens pack on Jack, concentrating on making the right adjustments before he spares a glance up. “Morrison, climb on. I know you’ve been wanting to.”

Jack tugs at the straps, bringing his hand to his shoulder to test the fit. Gabriel’s hand follows, brushing against Jack’s chest. “Yes, sir.”

The control panel reads one minute left. Gabriel hits the emergency side hatch, grabbing on to the railing as the wind blasts inside the control room. Behind him, Morrison loops his arm across Gabriel’s chest, hard-light cuffs glimmering against their skin. He attaches the rest of the straps to Gabriel’s belt—and Gabriel’s sure those particular straps are supposed to go around Jack’s own waist, not his.

There’s a weight limit to the parachute, and he’s sure they’re past it.

“This is the world’s shittiest trust fall,” Jack yells over the noise.

Gabriel takes a breath, looking down. The world below isn’t visible and all he sees are clouds and, surprisingly, the sunrise. It’s a little romantic, all things considered. Not a bad way to end a first date, and he’s sure there’s a song about it, somewhere. “You might want to rethink that. Might be your last words.”

Jack presses against him from behind, his forehead touching the back of Gabriel’s neck. Gabriel takes a step closer to the edge, listening as Jack shouts into his ear, his rough voice softened by the wind.

Gabriel’s chest flutters, and it has nothing to do with the thought of jumping out of an air carrier set to explode.

As far as potential last words go, they aren’t bad. Jack’s hand grabs on to his own, fingers warm against the chill and bands of hard-light, and Gabriel is hit with the sudden thought— _finally_. Finally.  

Gabriel takes the jump.

**Author's Note:**

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FCoUBEJAVg


End file.
